1. Technical Field
The present invention relates in general to the field of shipment packaging, and in particular to corrugated fiberboard packing. Still more particularly, the present invention relates to a single piece of corrugated fiberboard that, when folded, creates a six-sided cushion for fragile shipments.
2. Description of the Related Art
Light and fragile products, including electronic equipment, are typically shipped from a manufacturer to a customer or distributor via a common carrier. The products must therefore be packaged to prevent being damaged in transit from physical shock (jarring) caused by being dropped, jostled, etc. The force of such physical shock can be as much as 70 g's.
One method of protecting such equipment is to encase it with shock absorbing material such as Styrofoam® “peanuts.” However, such systems are messy, as the peanuts' light weight makes them prone to being scattered both during packing at the manufacturer's site as well as unpacking at the customer's site. Furthermore, Styrofoam® peanuts are not environmental friendly, since Styrofoam® is not biodegradable. Of even greater engineering significance is that peanuts are inconsistent in their protection against shock. That is, peanuts can shift about during transit, such that different areas within a shipping container are afforded unpredictably varying levels of impact protection.
Another method of protecting such equipment is to engineer a packing cushion, either from fabricated foam or molded material. Fabricated foam (such as polyurethane) is hand or die cut, and then assembled (typically using heat welding) to create a custom shaped protector. Fabricated foam is thus both labor intensive (in assembly steps) and materiel expensive (in the cost of component shapes and scrap material inherent in the assembly process). Molded material (such as polystyrene) is formed by a mold that is specific to the shape of the product being shipped. Molded materials are thus also both labor intensive (in creating and using the molds), equipment expensive (in the molding machines), and materiel expensive (cost of the molding material). Like the use of dunnage such as peanuts, fabricated foam and molded material are also environment unfriendly.